My studio is a room with a view of the Pacific. I paint with the door open — fresh air, whatever's coming through the speakers, and usually more questions than answers when I start.

I work from photographs and memory, but I try not to let either one be the boss. I'll choose a figure — someone whose posture or expression caught something I wanted to hold onto — and then let the paint take me somewhere. I don't plan compositions so much as discover them. Layers go down, things get covered, something unexpected emerges and I follow it. It's not so different from writing a song.

The figures in my work are often still, caught mid-thought. That's usually where I am too.